A thermal pool in Yellowstone National Park. What music would you pair with this picture?
Tag: piano lessons charlotte nc
Curriculum Questions
As students are heading back to school here in Charlotte, NC, and all over the country, we should ask ourselves; are we teaching the way students learn in today’s environment. Honestly with the competition between extra curricular activities we as teachers need to be up to date on the latest methods and learning styles. Are we incorporating the newest technology in our lessons? Are we excited about teaching?
What are questions that we should ask ourselves as teachers and what same questions should parents be asking?
1. What curriculum do you use? And part two of this question. Why do you use this curriculum?
As as teacher, do you use the same material because it is always what you’ve used, or because you believe it is the most relevant to today’s students? Do you use the best correlation with local festivals? Do you try to expose students to a wide variety of music and print styles?
2. Are your students active in the community? Festivals, talent shows, recitals, playing at nursing homes.
3. Do the students use technology to help keep them interested during the challenging parts of the curriculum? Online apps or flashcards? Notation software? Youtube performances? Are you utilizing these resources?
4. Are you following a curriculum of any kind that can aid a parent in understanding the rate of progress for the student?
5. Are the students learning about areas outside of music that relate to music? Roman numerals, world history, different cultures that have influenced nationalistic music?
Many times I think as teachers we can get in a rut. Even with a tried and true curriculum, there are opportunities for evaluation and introspection. As parents are calling and emailing, do you seem excited about the coming year or are you feeling the grind of hearing those same pieces again? It is up to us as educators to try to instill excitement for music and knowledge in our new and returning students.
A Break, A Sabbatical, A Vacation, A Return
I’ve been either in school or teaching full time since the fall of 2000. That is a long time! The month of August is a notoriously slow month on the lesson front. This year, I decided to do something different. The studio is closed for the entire month of August and the first week of September. What about the students? Most were vacationing at least part of the month, and all were glad not to have to negotiate the first few weeks of school with an after school activity.
I’m using this time to think about my methodology and where I want the studio to go in the next year. What’s been working and what needs a revamp?
The most useful thing that I’ve done this year is to have started using either a candle or incense on lesson days in the room off the studio. This combined with a quite minute. The quality of lessons has improved dramatically. So many of my students come directly from school or other activities. The students just aren’t as focused on that 30 or 45 minutes as they should be. As the student enters the studio we talk briefly about how the day went and get the books arranged at the piano. Then I ask the student to close their eyes and think about “how you practiced, what did you improve upon, and what you want to show me in your lesson.” Just a minute of silence for most of the students allows them to reset and leave the rest of the day at the door. I feel as a teacher that I’m getting a more accurate read on what the students are accomplishing during the week.
As we come back in the fall, I hope to have more students signing up for The Music Development Program exams. Previously known as RACE and the Carnegie Hall Achievement Program. This is a program that I believe in strongly. Whether the student takes the exams or just uses the principles laid out in the curriculum, my students are on a stronger and more through track than ever. Having an internationally recognized standard makes it so easy to know how a student is truly progressing in the literature. If you would like to find out more about this program, please let me know.
As always, Brunner Studio is scheduling lessons. Just because the studio is on break doesn’t mean that my email and phone don’t work! Please call or email if you would like to know more about piano, voice or oboe lessons for this fall. I can’t wait to hear from you.
My Baby…Grand That Is…Was Sick
Nothing like a sick piano to make a piano teacher break out into a sweat. Last Monday one of my students was playing a Chopin Nocturne. Since this student can a time be little gung ho with the arm weight, I recommended trying the Una Corda. It was a good effort, but didn’t produce the desired results so we moved on to other ideas. The next thing I knew the piano was sounding a bit odd and the student said that the und corda pedal was not working correctly. Oh boy. Sure enough it was stuck in the ‘on’ position.
Tuesday morning I called my wonderful tech to set an appointment. The soonest he could come out was next Tuesday. That was a week of odd sounding lessons. I thought it was interesting that some students noticed the strange sound and others didn’t. I many have to explore that issue. So the tech finally made it out today. Turns out that it really was a case of being stuck. A little Teflon power later and we were back in business. The tuning was in pretty good shape so other than some minor adjustments it was a quick fix.
Come back later this week to find out which group of my students has had the best long term success based on what time of year they started lessons. The answer might surprise you
Visions Fugitives
Over 10 years after learning #10 of Visions Fugitives and progressively learning more, I still love this set of pieces. There are still some that I just can’t manage very musically, but I love them all. Prokofiev certainly knew what he was doing when he composed this set of pieces.
Somehow I just now dragged out my copy to play these on my new piano. It was magic. When your favorite music sounds perfect on your dream piano, it makes all the effort worth it.
NFMC Scholarship Paper Work
Well the paperwork has landed for the NFMC Scholarship Piano Festival. It’s been sorted and organized and the schedule made out. It was relatively painless on my part. Once the system a system is in place it makes everything so much easier.
All of the teachers and students work quite hard preparing for these events. The chairmen of these events will only keep doing these jobs if it goes as smoothly as possible. How can we work together to make everyone’s experience the best it can be.
1. Teachers, check the rule book for instructions about special time request. Some events are very specific as to when you can do this. For most events, if the request isn’t turned in with the initial paperwork it probably is too late.
2. Teacher and Parents- check the calendar before signing up for a festival to see if there are any conflicting events. It always makes me upset for the student to hear that they have prepared a difficult piece only to have to withdraw the week of a performance due to a scheduling conflict.
3. Teachers- WRITE NEATLY!!!!! Excuse me, did I scream there? Sorry. Please take the time to write legibly so that the chair can read the student’s name and get the spelling correct. The same goes for the title of the works to be performed.
4. Chairmen- Have a organizational system set up before the paperwork begins arriving. Sort it as you go.
5. Chairmen- Learn to use Excel or a similar program. The sorting capabilities will save you lots of time and effort.
Good luck!
Setting Up For Success
The blog today is more of a thinking questions that anything else. How do you help your students mentally prepare for a successful lesson? So many of my students come into lessons with their minds just buzzing from their day. The level of distraction is pretty crazy. We spend the first few pieces just trying to get into the correct frame of mind to remember what we practiced and to slow down.
For the next few weeks, I am going to ask my students to take 1 minute and close their eyes and try and clear their minds of any distractions. Just take deep breaths and get into a piano frame of mind. Think about how they practiced and what they want to remember. My hope is that it will we will be able to focus better and have a more disciplined lesson.
For myself, I plan on taking 5 minutes before I begin teaching to go through the same process. So often teachers just run straight into a lesson with no breathing room. It sometimes causes our daily stress to bleed over into our teaching manner. I want to try to minimize this impact.
So how do you help your students focus?
Intermediate Madness
Last week was the first week back from Christmas break for about half of my students. There were highs and lows. Trying to get everyone to focus was challenging since it had been the first day back at school. The kids were all excited to tell me how their break went and to let me know that they had practiced. I told everyone that practice was optional over the break. I’m happy they (or their parents) kept working.
It seems that many of these students are hitting the early intermediate music at the same time. It makes me a little nervous. It is wonderful that they are working so hard and have reach this level so quickly. The challenge is caused by that same dedication. Most of these kids still want to complete pieces in a single week. Their music has just gotten to the point that it just isn’t feasible for the most part. Trying to explain that they haven’t done anything wrong, but it is going to take more time doesn’t always go over very well. All they hear is that they didn’t get a sticker that week. The next thing I hear is that piano is hard, and they aren’t having fun. Trying to find the correct balance is a challenge. Learning to appreciate longer term goals is just part of growing up. Practicing dedication even when things get difficult and it doesn’t seem fun at the moment is part of growing up. Coaxing these students through these challenging levels is hard work for everyone. I just hope the growing pains aren’t too bad!
Lessons Resume Jan. 2, 2013
Just a reminder that lessons at Brunner Studios will resume on Jan. 2, 2013. I look forward to the chance to continue on a musical journey with my students. Festival registration for NFMC and NCMTA ends next week. More students than ever will be participating.
Brunner Studios is currently accepting new students for piano, voice and oboe lessons. Please check the contact page for how you can reach us to schedule your trial lesson.
Off to teach some lessons!
NFMC 2013
Brunner Studios will be participating in the 2013 NMFC Piano Festival and Piano Scholarship Festival. As of now it looks like there will be 100% participation. Festivals are such a great opportunity for students to gain confidence in their playing and to get feedback from someone other than their teacher.
If you are interested in participating please contact a local teacher for more information.